Poll: How to respond to homework questions

[Hampus Ram]

On Thu, Aug 28 2003, Tom Pledger wrote:
> (A) Give a perfect answer.
> (B) Give a subtly flawed answer.

I would never ever do either A or B no matter how the question was
phrased. A does not really help and B is just plain mean.

> (C) Give an obfuscated answer.

C is not a very good way to go either. Wasting students time by giving
them answers that are very hard to understand is not nice however
stupid the question - and it will likely not make them into better
students/questioners.

> (D) Give a critique of what the questioner has tried so far.

If (s)he has done anything so far this is in my opinion the best thing
to do, just not too detailed, leaving some work to be done.

> (E) Give relevant general advice without answering the specific question.

This is always harmless, but probably seldom helpful, most likely
they already have a book filled with general advice and some tutor that
they can ask.

I.e: 
Ok: D, E
Not ok: A, B, C

/Hampus

-- 
Homepage: http://www.dtek.chalmers.se/~d00ram
E-mail: d00ram@dtek.chalmers.se

"Det är aldrig försent att ge upp"